Doodlebug

Driving home with my husband this evening I spotted a restaurant/lounge with a huge patio bar filled with people. Music playing people laughing and having fun on this warm summer evening. I found myself thinking wouldn't it be great to stop and have a few drinks? A refreshing Tom Collins, or some frosty thingie..... Like normal people can do. It's been a long hard week and a Friday evening relax and kick back sounded wonderful.

We didn't. But normal people can. What the hell? I'm not normal? No... the more I thought about it the more I realized that those couple of cool drinks would lead to nightly drinking again. Or would it? I don't know. I have not tried to have one or two. I am 80 days sober. I am a high bottom. I really do not know if I could do that. I don't want to risk it.

I guess that the fact that I am sitting here lamenting about it and typing it out on the computer and feeling sorry for myself about it says something. What the hell is normal anyway?

brigid

Normal people are the ones you don't know yet!

In time you might be able to go to these places and relax without having a drink and without feeling like you are missing out on something by not drinking. Lots of people can go out and not drink and still enjoy themselves.

Congrats on your 80 days sober, that is awesome stuff!!

love and peace,
Brigid

lulu70

I had those exact same feelings at about the same point in sobriety. Now I realize that those people really don't have anything MORE than what I have. They simply are doing something DIFFERENT than I am doing. Does that make sense? I also know that there are a number of them who will get out of control drunk--some of them while still out at the bars, some of them later on at home, alone--there will be others who will spend a lot of time monitoring their drinking and worrying about drinking too much. Doesn't sound very relaxing to me. I know what drinking will do to me. I'm glad I don't have to do it anymore.

Don't be too hard on yourself for having these thoughts. 80 days is fabulous, but you are still pretty early on in sobriety. It is hard to trust feelings until after about a year. Congratulations on staying away from it so far!!!!

2dayzmuse

The scene sounds so sophisticated and glamorous. Fast forward hours later when people are starting to get sloppy and obnoxious. Let's also view couples at home where alcohol has fueled another ugly domestic dispute. Not to mention the reality of the morning after, sick and hung over. It's easy to romanticise drinking and it's obeiance. The truth is, things can turn ugly very fast. It all isn't fun and glamor. What appears to be normal to us, may not be at all what we perceived.

CarolD

Gee I am normal. I just don't drink or eat chicken.

Peter

"Normal people?"

Never did like that expression......

All those so called "normies" (as many of my fellow addicted friends likes to say) have there own challenges in life to face.

Just because my challenge in life is staying sober does not make me any better or worse than anybody else.

doorknob

I've done karaoke sober. Anything is possible!

Don S

Recently my son and I visited a luxurious coastal Southern California community. We walked along the street where the restaurants and bars are, nearly all open-air, on a lovely balmy evening of the type SoCal is famous for. We smelled the wonderful food, stopped to listen to the incredibly tight quartet playing jazz at one place, watched some couples dancing slowly at another. We had some ice cream and expresso, window shopped and looked at art galleries. We had a great time dissecting the snatches of conversation we heard--some drunken, some awkward, mostly odd or banal.
We were normal, they were normal. We weren't drinking. Some of them were, some weren't.
Next time, I suggest you enjoy the senses of the evening rather than dwelling on what you think you're missing. It's all there, and it's all so much better without alcohol. But that can be our secret.

Islandchild

What you were feeling when you were typing this thread was "normal" for an alcoholic!! It is natural and normal for us to look at the ambiance of a situation and think only of that - not where that first drink led us to begin with!! I remember going out to dinner with my husband to a very fancy restaurant, dressed up, looking good, and eating a fabulously expensive meal with before dinner drinks, wine, and more drinks for "dessert". Fast forward two hours later, I was in the parking lot, hanging out the side of the car, vomiting my brains out. So much for atmosphere. All I can tell you for sure was that it was pretty ugly and pathetic.
Remembering where that first drink leads us, walking through the scenario, right up to the point when I am hugging the porcelin god, helps me to snap back to reality - I am an alcoholic and I cannot drink like "normal" people!
By the way, I get together with sober friends for fancy coffee drinks now - we sit outside under the umbrellas and watch the world go by. That is more fun than anything!
God bless - great post!

findingout

For me, there is a tendenancy to see that group of people enjoying the nice summer evening with the music and the conversation and think that it is all happening because of the alcohol and it could not happen without the alcohol and because I cannot have the alcohol I cannot have the experience.

That's just an example of, as they say, "not my best thinking." For me, especially at the end, quality experiences happened inspite of the alcohol not because of it. Alcohol didn't make me sociable, alcohol made me drunk. Alcohol didn't give me courage, alcohol made me drunk. And at the end, that's all I wanted to be.

Some people can drink alcohol without suffering consequences, I cannot. I know this because I have proved it time and time and time again. Does that make me abnormal? Does that mean my life is, and always will be, diminished in some key respect that dooms me to a lesser experience of my time on the planet? No, but that, I think, is just what my alcoholism wants me to believe, that is the lingering obssesion with alcohol - the idea that as good as my life is today, it would be just that much better if only I could drink like a normal person.

Grasshopper

Normal people?????Hmmm,everyone has their own quirks,and issues thats for sure.Normal is of course in the eyes of the beholder,lol.
Ive always understood, when folks ,at meetings or,wherever are referring to non-alcoholics, ,its , not,the people they are talking about,but ---normal drinking-,thats being adressed.Normal drinking is to know when to stop,i dont do this,i keep on,and on and on with my first drink.Ive seen those normal drinkers.They feel a little tispy,and they stop.Cant figure out these ,folks,,lol.
Outside of my being an alcoholic,{drinking abnormal}..im, as normal as they come.....smile!!!!!

kali ma

Well put. I couldn't (and still can't) figure out how they stop. Once I had one martini, I knew I was in for at least three...

Good post, Doodlebug. I have been feeling the same EXACT way. Thanks for the posts, everyone.

sugarssweetpea

The funny thing is that the people who were sitting there drinking the alcohol probably never even noticed the ambience about it. I never did. I was just focusing on the drinking part of it. Relaxed, yeah, until I fell down & hurt myself or got into a car wreck. More relaxing would be to just have a virgin frozen drink or a smoothie somewhere. Same cool, refreshing feeling - one that you will actually remember.

NYCGirl

When I first stopped drinking, a short 7 weeks ago I had repeated thoughts of how I would love to drink like normal people. In that short time my thoughts have changed. I am realizing that all those things I used to do drunk are really much better sober. Now my thoughts are more I can do all those things the drunk people do except now I remember them. let's be honest even those "normal people" are known to go overboard times.

Oh yeah, and I get to tell them what they did the next day lol.

MNGirlyGirl

Exactly! That type of situation is also a big trigger for me. Watching people sitting outside having happy hour on a beautiful summer day.

I always have to remind myself that "normal drinkers" could take it or leave it. The most certainly wouldn't have the huge craving that I get. I also have to remind myself that I know it wouldn't be just one.... and it probably wouldn't be just one night.

Music

If drinking or not, makes a person normal or not, we're all in trouble. I get up every morning at 4:00 to go to the gym and work out. Does that make me normal and everyone who doesn't do that not normal. I think not! I like what Don S said. There are so many other things to enjoy now that I don't drink.

Arura

I think the so called 'Normies' should all do the steps... !.ALL 12 of them, they might not be so self-ignrarnt {sp?}. They would see themselves differently......and others...!

I love that saying 'the only normal people are the ones you dont know'...!

...x .

sugarssweetpea

I have to say also that how many people sitting outside on that deck do you really think are so called "normal" & able to control their drinking. I agree with the above post about doing the 12 steps & finding a little bit out about themselves. I never thought I had a problem. For the longest time I thought I was "normal" & everyone who did not drink was wierd. IMO there are very very few people who can drink just a few once in a while. IMO

paulmh

Oh, now that I go out sober I can see just how few people drink like I used to - though at the time, sugarsweetpea I thought everyone was doing it. And as for "normals" doing the 12 steps - I've thought about this in the past, and I think that it's true, that everyone woudl benefit from doing the 12 steps, but in the same way that "everyone" would benefit from doing 12 weeks basic training in the army. The 12 step programme is designed by and for people with a particular set of...... shall we say, shortcomings? My wife is an astonishing woman, who has an appropriately sized ego, essentially keeps herself in the moment, is tolerant of other people, accepts what life throws at her up to a point where she is not a victim to it, lives without fear and anger - in other words, the programme might benefit her as a normal - but nothing like as much as it can benefit me!

Five

The only thing that seperates me in 'terms of the rest of the world' is that I drank too much alcohol over a period of time.

Thats it.